“Whew, it’s done.”

Face pale, Sunggoo wiped the sweat off his forehead. The last floor of the Mine had been an open space, and there had been enough monsters to carpet the floor. Of course, Sunggoo hadn’t been sweating because he had been participating in the battle.

Woojin looked over at him, “Did you excavate it all?”

In response, Sunggoo hefted the bag of Bloodstones, "How can someone like big brother be F Rank? At the very least, you should be D Rank. Since you have a lot of abilities, you could even qualify for C Rank, "

“I’ll get it later.” Woojin replied indifferently. 

Sunggoo looked at Woojin as if he was looking at a monster. Every monster on the last floor had been killed by Woojin and his summons. Sunggoo had been assigned the task of extracting Bloodstones from the corpses that Woojin pointed at. Essentially, he’d been relegated to clean up.

Woojin seemingly had no trouble dealing with one or two star monsters by himself. In Sunggoo’s eyes, his battle ability was easily D Rank, and he probably wouldn’t lose to a C Rank in terms of sheer versatility. He could summon Skeleton Soldiers from any corpse and find Bloodstones with uncanny accuracy. He had also recently begun to extract some grey energy from monster corpses and use it to heal himself.

Wasn’t there a saying that sandalwood was fragrant even as a seed? Sunggoo looked at this person, who’d finished his Awakened registration only that day. He believed this so-called newbie Awakened would become a force to be reckoned with.

But first, Woojin seemed to be doing something odd. Sunggoo asked, “Uh? What are you doing? You are going to learn it instead of selling it?”

Woojin didn’t stop, “Yeah, why?”

Woojin infused the Magic Scroll with his magic. As the scroll turned into shards of light, Woojin absorbed the magic, [Electric Shock]. He still had a lot of skills left to learn, so he thought it best to save his Achievement Points. At that point, since he already had the scroll, he decided to learn [Electric Shock].

Even if he wanted to learn a higher ranked Magic, he could only learn from common Scrolls or Necromancer-specific Magic Scrolls. Still, Electric Shock would be useful in battle. There was no downside in learning it.

Sunggoo was unconvinced, “Huh, you already have a lot of abilities, yet you are learning more magic, big brother? If you had sold it, you could have gotten one hundred million won….”

“……?” Woojin froze. A mere hundred point Magic Scroll was worth a hundred million won?

He slowly turned to face Sunggoo, “… It was that expensive?”

Sunggoo obliviously responded, “Of course. Something that gives you an additional ability is qualitatively better than an Artifact.”

An Artifact required magical energy to be injected before it could display its magic. On the other hand, a Magic Scroll allowed an Awakened to permanently learn the magic. With a Magic Scroll, one didn’t have to worry about losing it, and even a low ranked Magic Scroll could be used for research. Of course it would be expensive.

Woojin was bewildered, “Huh? Why would such an expensive item drop in a mere two star dungeon?”

“I’m not sure.” Sunggoo replied, bemused, “ You must be really lucky. It’s not like it never happens, but it just doesn’t show up all that often. What kind of magic was it?”

“It’s the one you got hit with.” Woojin said, still shocked, “It’s the Electric Shock that was used by the Hobgoblin.”

Sunggoo whistled, "Huh. You would have gotten one hundred million at the very least...”

One hundred million. It was one hundred million won.

Woojin sighed. If he’d known that the Magic Scroll was worth one hundred million then he would have just used a hundred points to learn [Electric Shock]. He wanted to buy the Magic Scroll from the Achievement Shop and sell it, but Skill Books purchased from the Achievement Shop couldn’t be used in a transaction.

Only Woojin could learn it.

Woojin had already spent Achievement Points back then to learn [Soul Extraction] and heal the barely alive Sunggoo. It had cost him fifty points, but it was an ability he would use time and again in the future.

After a monster or a person dies, their souls remain inside their corpses for a brief time. At that moment, he could extract the souls to use as energy to recover magic, vitality, or stamina.

Whether it was magic, vitality or stamina, each soul could only recover a small portion. When Woojin injected it into someone else, the efficacy decreased.

Sunggoo had thought Woojin was using healing magic, but the truth was different. Woojin was stealing the remnant life force of the dead to share with him.

“Ssssoop, whew. Let’s not worry about the cost.” Woojin tried to soothe his aching intestines. If he had sold the Magic Scroll, then he wouldn’t have needed to dive into a dungeon for a long while. No, if he thought about how low real estate value had fallen in Seoul, he could have moved into a huge villa that was much bigger than the current one room….

Ah, let’s not think about it.

He changed the subject quickly, “How much can I get with this many Bloodstones?”

Sunggoo was only too happy to reply, “At the very least, you should get around 8,000,000 won. I think you can get more though. I’m not too sure…”

He had invested 100,000 won, so this was a good amount of profit. If his party members hadn’t run away, he’d only have received 1,000,000 won as his cut.

Woojin’s eyes turned sharp, “It’s all mine.”

Sunggoo felt a shiver crawl up his spine, “Of-of course.”

“What about the Return Stone?” Woojin looked around. 

“I have it here.” Sunggoo replied instantly. 

“Then let’s go.” Woojin decided. 

Woojin and Sunggoo swept the Bloodstones into the bag and started to make their way up the stairs.

“...It looks like an ambush.” He only had a low level detection skill in [Detect], but Woojin could feel a faint murderous intent. When Woojin came to a stop and warned Sunggoo, Sunggoo’s expression also turned serious.

They had killed all the monsters. Unless they re-entered the dungeon, the monsters wouldn’t respawn. The only way an ambush would happen is if it was Bae Dohsoo’s party.

Sunggoo’s voice started to tremble, "Are they trying to kill us?”

“Does this happen often?” Woojin questioned Sunggoo.

Sunggoo swallowed, “It happens occasionally. It probably happens more off the record. This is why people don’t party up with a group they don’t know. It’s like hell’s gates open when they find a treasure like a Magic Scroll or an Artifact.”

Woojin turned pensive, “If a fight does happen, how does it get handled?”

Sunggoo’s voice turned fearful, "No one knows what happens inside a dungeon. There’s an unwritten rule that they only act when there’s indisputable evidence.”

Woojin grinned, as he looked up the stairwell, “Huh. Then it’s easy to dispose of a dead body.”

He looked back, glancing over the monster corpses lying everywhere. Woojin took a couple of steps away from the stairway, Sunggoo following him.

When he felt like he was far enough away, he called out, “Hey, stop hiding like a bunch of rats. Why don’t you come out?”

A moment of silence passed before Bae Dohsoo’s party stepped out and onto the stairs. One of the fighters had an awkward expression on his face, and another seemed apologetic, but the remaining had stern expressions.

Bae Dohsoo smiled slyly, “What happened? Did you defeat them all?”

Woojin murmured to Sunggoo, “I’m planning on taking him by surprise when he gets close.”

“What should I do?” Sunggoo looked at Woojin with worried eyes. 

Woojin shrugged, and turned back to Bae Dohsoo, "Hey, it’s the bastards who ran away yet has the balls to show up in front of us again. Why are you here when you should be waiting in front of the barrier?”

The blatantly disrespectful words made Bae Dohsoo’s eyelids twitch, but he managed to keep his expression neutral as he laughed awkwardly, "Haha. Why are you being like this? Aren’t we on the same team? It was just a tactical retreat, so we came back to clear the last floor. But it seems like you killed all the monsters. How’d you do that?”

Bae Dohsoo’s thoughts were completely in disarray. He couldn’t believe that two F Rank Awakened were capable of clearing all the monsters. He glanced at the bag filled with Bloodstones.

Woojin caught his glance and started to laugh. Those blinded by greed truly couldn’t see what was right in front of their eyes.

He sneered, “Stop fucking around. First, you wanted to just snatch the Return Stone and flee, but now you’re coveting another meal?”

Woojin threw the bag filled with Bloodstones in front of him.

Chwa-roo-rook.

The bag hit the floor midway between Woojin and Bae Dohsoo’s party, spilling Bloodstones over the floor. 

“If you want it that bad, pick it up.”

Bae Dohsoo’s expression stiffened at Woojin’s mocking tone, "It seems that you’ve misunderstood us. Do you think we’d try to kill someone who killed a monster we couldn’t take on? We aren’t that stupid.”

Woojin’s stare bored into him, "Go on.”

Bae Dohsoo’s voice grew animated, "I’m sorry for not looking for you. What else could I do? My life was also on the line. Yes, we came back to look for the Return Stone. But since you’ve cleared the Mine, we were also fortunate enough to retrieve Jongchul’s body. I am very thankful to you for that.”

Woojin started to feel like he’d been too paranoid. People on Earth weren’t like the ones on Alphen. Perhaps they had been hiding at the top of the staircase just in case they ran into a monster? Thinking about things from their side, they wouldn’t have had an idea what was on the last floor.

Maybe I’m being too sensitive...

Alphen had been a place where people betrayed each other for less than a fistful of cash. He’d lived on a razor’s edge because he had to be careful of everyone. However, this was Earth. This was Seoul. 

If there was one place where peace and morality would still exist….

Hwa-roo-roo-rook.

… My ass.

Woojin threw an arm over his eyes to shield them from the sparks that suddenly ignited in front of them.

Bae Dohsoo roared, “Now!”

The archer acted instantly, drawing, aiming, and firing at Sunggoo. They had to neutralize his fireball ability before they could make any headway against the two Awakened.

After Bae Dohsoo had run away, he’d come to an agreement with his party. They weren’t skilled enough to attempt a two star dungeon. The money wasn’t as appealing, but they decided to return to attacking one star dungeons. 

They had snuck back to see if there was a chance to quietly steal the Return Stone, but all they found were monster corpses. They even found the Hobgoblin corpse, carelessly tossed to the side.

Greed slowly took root in Bae Dohsoo.

They’d only found Jongchul’s corpse in that battlefield. Woojin and Sunggoo’s corpses were missing. This meant the two of them had gone on to attempt the bottom floor by themselves.

If they were able to defeat the Hobgoblin, it meant one of them was hiding his real ability. So they’d prepared an ambush, but their opponents had seen through it with one glance.

So Bae Dohsoo tried to put Woojin at ease first. At the same time, his eyes had flicked to the ravaged battlefield behind them. He needed to know whether it was worth trying to kill them. He had almost fainted when Woojin had thrown the bag of Bloodstones forward.

From just what he could see, that bag contained enough Bloodstones to be a month’s worth of trips to a one star dungeon. But he also confirmed from Woojin’s words that the latter was suspicious of them.

If Woojin was on guard against them, it would be dangerous to attack them. He was still wary since he didn’t know how they’d killed the monsters of the last floor. But when he glanced again at the bag of Bloodstones, he decided that it was worth attacking them. 

He silently gave his teammates the signal, and immediately activated his ability. Woojin’s face was engulfed in flames, and an arrow pierced through Sunggoo’s shoulder.

“Gah!” Sunggoo yelped. 

Bae Dohsoo’s party had started attacking Sunggoo even before the flames had formed. Their weapons would have an easier time cutting through human flesh than toughened monster hide.

“Whew. Please don’t resent me. Aren’t all Awakened like this?” Bae Dohsoo spoke as he drew the dagger at his belt and swung at the staggering Woojin.

Sheeenn.

Even though the flames had reduced his ability to see, Woojin was able to snatch a glimpse of the dagger stabbing towards him. With uncanny accuracy, his hand snaked out to grab Bae Dohsoo’s wrist, turned it over his shoulder, and threw him across the room. Woojin’s strength and speed rivaled that of an Awakened with a physical ability, so Bae Dohsoo simply didn’t have enough time to do anything before he crashed heavily against the staircase.

“Whew. That’s pretty hot.”

As the flames faded into flickering embers, Woojin scrubbed at his face with a hand. He glared at the petrified party members, who’d stopped in their tracks when their leader had gone flying. Sunggoo was still holding his shoulder and staring at Woojin with tear-filled eyes.

“Really, it was a pretty insolent attack.”

His face was slightly red, and it seemed like he’d taken some minor burns. However, Woojin was grinning.

“I guess I should have expected this?”

Woojin spread his arms.

Pah-pahk!

The monster corpses closest to him ripped open, scraps of flesh flying everywhere. If someone had a weak constitution, it was enough to make them faint from horror.

“Resent me.”

Woojin’s eyes turned cold.

Resentment wouldn’t change anything.

“I’ll laugh to my heart’s content.”

He’d take on all the resentment of the weak. It would be too cruel for him to deny them that much since their souls would be imprisoned in their fall from grace.

The bone knives of the Skeleton Soldiers knew no hesitation or mercy.

“Ahh!”

The entire party was taken down in mere moments. Woojin walked slowly towards Bae Dohsoo. His eyes were wide, and his hands twitched.

“W, wait a moment, let’s talk….”

“Are you waiting for your ability’s cooldown to expire?”

Shiiik.

Woojin coolly sank the dagger he’d taken from Bae Dohsoo into his heart. Bae Dohsoo trembled, and life faded from his eyes. Woojin’s eyes were dispassionate as he took Bae Dohsoo’s bag. 

It was filled with the Bloodstones they’d collected before they’d met the Hobgoblin. Woojin riffled through Bae Dohsoo’s body and calmly took all the cash from the wallet he found. As he serenely stripped anything of value from Bae Dohsoo’s cooling corpse, he found himself humming a tune.

Un-unbelievable.

Four lives had been snuffed out in an instant. Sunggoo covered his mouth with his hands as he forcefully stopped the words bubbling up from within. He had completely forgotten about the arrow in his shoulder. 

Oblivious, Woojin also went through the pockets of the other members of the party. 

As he was searching, he started to speak quietly, "Anyways, the bastards who try to stab me in the back will never speak again.”

Sunggoo’s eyes trembled uncontrollably. He didn’t know whether those words were for his benefit or not.

Woojin continued, eerily calm, "The people I hate the most are those who try to stab others in the back. Isn’t that right, Sunggoo?”

Woojin turned to glance at Sunggoo and met his eyes. Sunggoo was so terrified that he nearly soiled himself. Woojin had just killed four people, but he looked completely unconcerned.

When someone killed a monster, or even a small animal, they usually felt excited, or even guilty. Some kind of emotion would stir in their hearts, but Woojin looked like he’d done something no more mundane than pulling weeds from the side of a road. There wasn’t even the slightest fluctuation in his emotions.

To Sunggoo, it felt like Woojin was something more than a murderer.

Woojin’s utter calm, more than anything else, drove terror deep into Hong Sunggoo.

Woojin blinked, "Why aren’t you answering me?”